The Case of the Maiden Tribute
by Katta
Summary: Holmes and Watson set out to rescue a little girl - a straightforward case, but one that might still prove dangerous.


**Author's warning: This story includes depictions of violence, as well as off-screen sexual abuse of a child.**

* * *

_Note from John Watson to Sherlock Holmes:_

_Holmes,_

_As I am sure you understand, this is not for publication. Deal with it as you please; I found that it compelled me to write it._

_Note from Sherlock Holmes to John Watson:_

_Document has arrived, and after reading I have found a suitable arrangement for its safekeeping. Much obliged. I look forward to seeing you and Mrs. Watson at Janet Achurch's performance tonight. If you would?_

_Note from John Watson to Sherlock Holmes:_

_Always._

_

* * *

_

It all started with a common visit by a client in Holmes's den at Baker Street – and 'common' indeed must be said to describe the client as well. Despite the expensive cut of her clothes, the woman's profession shone through to such an extent that I found her appearance in my friend's quarters rather awkward. Her purple dress had lavish, crass details, the gloves were cheap and ill-fitting, the lips and cheek were of an unnatural colour, and her speech held an affected articulation. The combined result was very damning, but her features were lovely, and she was in such obvious distress that pity overtook me and I offered her as chivalrous a greeting as I could muster.

Holmes, true to his nature, remained in his chair and gave her a disinterested glance that I suspected nevertheless told him more about her than I could learn in a month, and asked, "What can I do for you then, Miss...?"

"My name is Mrs. Aisling Cooper," she said. "The most horrible thing..." Her face was contorted in grief, and she burst into tears.

Holmes's eyes narrowed, and he took his feet down, leaning forward. "Who's putting your daughter in danger? One of your business associates?"

Knowing him so well, I was more surprised at the euphemism than the deduction. Mrs. Cooper's reaction, of course, was quite different.

"How did you...?" she started, as so many had before her.

"Your gloves."

She looked down at her gloves and gently stroked the hem of one with her thumb. "She made them for me."

"I know. A most loving girl, if not much accomplished in needlework. How old is she, twelve?"

"Eleven. And she _is_ most loving." Mrs. Cooper spoke of the subject with evident difficulty. "That beast has stolen her away from me."

I pulled out a chair, moved by a mother's tears, no matter the circumstances. "Why don't you take a seat and explain it all to us?"

She did as she was bidden. "I have a new benefactor. He's a good man, he is, truly good, and he has a nice little house ready for me in Bath. I mean to start a new life there, with Dora, my daughter, but when Jennings – my former... business associate, as you call him – learnt of my plans, he wouldn't hear of it. I tried to offer him money, all that I could, with promise of more." Her mouth twitched in barely hidden rage. "He took it all and said it wasn't enough. This morning, the bastard took Dora while I was down at the baker's. He has her hidden somewhere. I don't know where, and even if I did, he has guards, and connections. Last month alone, he had a girl disappear for thwarting him."

The thought of a child in the middle of this sordid mess was sickening. Fortunately, the case appeared simple enough, though the dangers of course were considerable. I saw no reason why my friend would not be able to accommodate her.

Holmes saw it differently. "Madam, this is a police matter," he said with evident displeasure. "Your daughter cannot be so expertly hidden that the police would not be able to find her, and I am sure they will, with some persuasion from your benefactor. If they are unwilling to comply, I suggest you threaten to take the matter to the _Gazette_. You have no need for my expertise."

"Oh, I can't go to the peelers! Even if they found her, they'd only take Dora away again. It'd be straight to the poorhouse with her. I know what you gentlemen must think of me, but I'm a good mother, and in my new circumstances, I would have every chance of raising her as a good girl." She spoke with fervour, her pale chin trembling and blue Irish eyes blazing with emotion.

"Be that as it may, this is not a case for a detective. Hire some thug, if you must, and..."

"Holmes," I interrupted, nodding towards the door, "may I have a word with you?"

Somewhat reluctantly, he rose from his chair and followed me out of the room. I closed the door behind us and fixed him with my gaze.

"It is a police matter," he told me as he'd told her.

"She won't go to the police. And I'm not sure she's wrong."

He grunted and lifted his hands in a "what can I do?" gesture.

"_Is_ she a good mother?" I pressed.

After a moment's pause, he admitted, "Yes. She is."

"And the so-called benefactor?"

"I cannot say for sure without meeting him. But even if he is everything she claims he is, this is not a suitable case. There is no mystery, no problem."

"No problem? There is the problem of getting the child out of there, alive and well!"

"True. But that is systematical thinking, not analytical."

"That's splitting hairs!"

"No. No, it's not."

His tone was so soft, and the crack in his demeanour showed such a chasm of despair, that I fell silent, reminded of how a difference that meant so little to me was so very vast in his mind.

"There's a child in this," I said. "A child that may be subjected to unspeakable horrors."

"Don't let emotion get the better of you. You are asking me to focus without any proper work to focus _on_."

"I know. And I'm sorry." I truly was, at that point. "But I can't see any other way. Do it for me, if you will not do it for them."

He sighed, rubbing his forehead. I wondered if he had put himself under the influence of some drug when I had not noticed.

"I won't be at the top of my game," he said at long last.

"Any game at all is more than she has at this point." With gentle sarcasm, I added, "And we are sticking our hands into a hornet's nest. Perhaps when the stingers start flying at us, you'll find it easier to focus."

He gave a slight smile. "Perhaps. Very well. Tell the blasted woman I want to speak with that benefactor of hers. If he turns out to be a swindler, the deal is off."

* * *

Few men could have looked less like a swindler than Mr. Bolton. He was a small, nervous little man with soft flesh and a weak chin, as well as an estate that caused me to give a low whistle when the coach pulled up.

"Such a terrible thing to happen," he said, and patted Mrs. Cooper's hand. She gave him a quivering smile that at least to me spoke of genuine gratitude, if not love. Holmes's opinions on the matter I could not gauge. "My poor Aisling, the ordeal it is for her! Of course, gentlemen, should you take the case you have my help in any way you could wish for. I will hunt down these men to the end of the world if I must."

I threw Holmes a quick sideways glance, wondering if he'd be able to turn down the offer without hurting the poor man's dignity. As honest as Bolton's sentiments no doubt were, the idea of having his assistance on the case was equal parts dreadful and laughable.

Holmes, however, did not address the matter at all. He wandered around the room, looking at this and that, asked Mr. Bolton a few general questions regarding his relationship with Mrs. Cooper, and then sprung the question: "Do you own a weapon?"

Bolton straightened in his chair. "I have a shotgun."

"And this house in Bath? Is it ready for inhabitants?"

"Yes."

"Good. Then this is what you do. Take Mrs. Cooper to Bath in your personal carriage. Bring the shotgun with you and keep it loaded, in case you are followed. Do not stop for any of Mrs. Cooper's belongings, nor send for them. Once in Bath, wait for us to arrive with the girl. If we are lucky, this might happen as early as tomorrow, but at this point, I can offer no guarantees."

Little red flushes became visible under the powder on Mrs. Cooper's cheeks. "Do you expect me to just run off, without my daughter?"

Holmes, who had been twiddling with a clock, put it back on its table. "Yes, Madam, that is exactly what I expect. Your presence here is no longer safe, and your possibilities concerning your daughter are limited. I have found no evidence that there is anyone following you, but this fortituity cannot be taken for granted. The sooner you leave, the greater are your chances – and your daughter's chances. I trust you have not spoken to anyone about your new residence-to-be?"

"I told them that I am leaving."

"But not where to?"

"No."

"Good. Now, tell me everything you can about your former employer."

Mrs. Cooper cast a glance under long eyelashes at Bolton, and after a beat, Holmes said, "Mr. Bolton, if you would please start arrangements."

"Oh, of course, anon!" Bolton said, a flush rising on his cheeks. He gently kissed Mrs. Cooper's hand, bowed to us, and withdrew from the room.

Once he was gone, Mrs. Cooper started speaking. Due to the nature of the subject, her answers were at times of a delicate nature, and I admit that there were moments when I tried to focus my thoughts on other matters, counting on my friend's colder disposition to deal with the facts of the case. Suffice to say, we were given ample information not only of Jennings's lodgings and the number of women in his employ, but also of some rather sickening details of his habits. Normally, during Holmes's interviews with clients, I try to write down details of our cases, in case they should prove significant. Not having his memory, I find it best. This time, though, beyond the man's address and physical description, my pencil lay unused. I could not bear to jot such beastly things down, nor am I ever likely to forget them, should I try all my life.

Holmes took it all in stride, tapping his chin and asking the occasional question that did not always strike me as essential; but then, I was used to that.

"I think I have the facts all clear," he said at last. "I should be able to recover your daughter shortly and bring her to your new residence."

Mrs. Cooper's eyes welled up and she nodded, too overcome with emotion to speak.

"Do you have any friends whom you trust, who might provide us with more information should we need it?"

At this, her sobs broke loose in a mournful laughter. "Oh, you must be joking! That's a good way to get oneself killed, it is. Anyone who tried had better leave town herself." She frowned suddenly, in thought, and Holmes pounced on that.

"There is someone," he said. "Not one of your colleagues. Someone you think you could convince Mr. Bolton to bring along. Another child. A boy?"

Too stunned to answer at first, she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand before she said, "Your skills are truly as remarkable as they say, Mr. Holmes. Yes, I was thinking of Simina's boy. He is an old playmate of my daughter's, and since his mother died last year he has often spoken of leaving the city."

"Excellent!" Holmes exclaimed. "Just what I need."

"He's just a child, though."

"Never underestimate children. They often make very good sleuths."

Mr. Bolton returned at that point, which changed the conversation to the practicalities of their journey. Holmes and I soon excused ourselves, ready to start the physical part of our investigation.

Mrs. Cooper grabbed Holmes's hand on our way out the door and pleaded, "You will wire me, will you not? To tell me how it's going?"

He slowly pulled his hand away and replied, "Certainly, if that's what you want."

"Every day until you rescue her? Or – can't rescue her?"

"Madam, I do not foresee this taking more than a day or two."

She smiled at that. "You have a very high opinion of yourself. God willing, it is warranted." With that, she kissed his cheek and bid us farewell.

* * *

The weather had taken a turn for the worse: the air was chilly and I could feel the cold weight of oncoming rain – or even sleet – in my bones. Yet my mind was too preoccupied for me to pay that much attention. Holmes whistled for a hansom, and I sat quiet, mulling over the horrible prospects of what might befall the girl if we were not as quick to find her as Holmes anticipated.

I also, I admit, spent some time pondering Mrs. Cooper. As a mother, she struck me as the very example of womanly virtues. As a lover...

"You don't suppose she really loves him, do you?"

"Hm? No, of course not," Holmes said absentmindedly. "She loves the life he can provide for her, and she will do anything to protect it." He caught sight of my expression, and smirked. "Oh, the horror of a whore selling her affection for worldly goods! No need to look so affronted, Watson, my lad."

"I'm not affronted."

He leaned back and scrutinized me. "You are quite taken with the woman. Whatever would Mrs. Watson say?"

"You keep Mrs. Watson out of this!" I snapped. "Aesthetic appreciation is not the same as being 'taken with' somebody. Or would you deny that the lady is beautiful?"

"Not at all," he said. "Her features are remarkably fine and regular. I, however, do not attach any importance to that when it comes to judging her character."

I was about to give a cutting remark on his general cold-heartedness, but his mention of Mary brought her face forward in my mind, mixing with the face of Mrs. Cooper so that I saw Mary with that look of absolute despair. If we had children, and some brute took hold of one of them... Who was to say it would not happen, with the risks I ran?

The hansom pulled to a stop, a few blocks from our destination, which was Mrs. Cooper's former home. From a distance, it looked just like any other house, no more or less respectable than the rest on that street. Coming closer, I noticed that the blinds on most of the windows were drawn even though it was barely suppertime, and that a bull-necked ruffian was leaning against the doorway, his beady eyes following the passersby.

We stopped to appraise the situation. Though it would be quite possible to fight our way past the man, it seemed pointless; Dora would not be held in her own mother's home, and any search for clues would be severely hindered by a scuffle. Nor would it be recommendable to start the search while he was still at guard. A distraction would be our best option.

"Watson," Holmes said, having drawn the same conclusion, "please entertain the gentleman while I survey our surroundings."

"Any particular form of entertainment?" I asked.

"Haggle for prices?" At my glare, Holmes sighed. "Or would you prefer that _I_ haggle for prices while _you_ survey the surroundings?"

He had me there. My powers of observation had greatly improved just by being in proximity to him, but I could never match his uncanny talent. Thus I tipped my hat at him and walked up to the man by the door.

"Evening, sir," the man said, peering at me. It was hard to tell whether there was sarcasm in his voice or it always sounded like that.

"Good evening," I replied. "I mean to visit this fine establishment, and I was wondering if you could tell me a bit more about your offers."

His eyebrows shot up under the sweaty brim of his cap. "Our offers? Depends on what you're looking for, don't it? If it's just your regular roll in the hay, we've got ladies of every kind. Blondes, brunettes, redheads, Spanish girls, Indian girls, even a real Negro girl. But she costs extra."

"She would, wouldn't she," I said, trying not to seem distracted even though my ears were straining to hear what Holmes was up to. "How much, then?"

"For the Negro lass? Ten pounds, same as a virgin. Prices are up for virgins after the laws changed. The rest of them are only one pound each for an hour and six shillings for a quickie, unless you've got special demands."

"Ten for a virgin?" I said, my voice as level as I could make it. "And how old are these virgins?"

"Well, sir, at the moment we have a pair of budding beauties at the cusp of womanhood. Would that be to your tastes?"

"Do you have anyone as young as..." Saying eleven would be too suspicious, and in any case prostitutes hardly ever gave their real age. I settled for, "Ten or so?"

He hissed a lament between his teeth. "Sorry, not at the moment. We had a ripe Irish lassie, but she's been promised away. You can have her in a few days, if it's the age you're looking for, not the maidenhood."

My hand closed hard on the head of my walking stick, as I quelled the desire to clock him between the eyes. "Indeed? You're preparing one right now? Where is she kept?"

His already small eyes narrowed further. "Why do you ask?"

"Just wondered if I could have a look at her, that's all." Any further in this direction and I would give myself away, and Holmes had not asked me to pump the man for information, only to distract him. I searched my brain for something that would prove distracting enough. "What about men? Preferably with whips. Do you have any?"

"They're down on Dorset Street. Number 26." He crossed his arms. "What's it going to be, then? Man, woman or child?"

I heard the low tunes of a whistled melody and recognized it as "Johnny Be Fair." Holmes was finished with his work.

"I think man, today," I said, giving a curt nod. "I shall talk it over with my friend. You have been most helpful. Good day."

I returned to Holmes by the corner of the block and told him quietly what I had found out.

"She's not with the men at Dorset Street," he said. "Dorset Street is east of here, and I found this in a wheel track on the western side of the building." He shook his handkerchief out of his pocket and surreptitiously showed me the pale blue hair ribbon covered within. "Same stitches as on the gloves, dark hairs with the roots still attached. It seems to have fallen off as they loaded little Dora into a carriage."

"I don't suppose we can follow the tracks?" I said, looking down the street. Even as I spoke, I knew how hopeless a suggestion that was.

"A tire track in London, almost a day old? I can recognise the carriage when I find it, but that is all. If I still had access to Toby, it would be a different matter. A pity good dogs are so hard to find. Gladstone's no use."

"Gladstone is no use because you keep feeding him poison. All right, then, what do we do?"

Holmes let his gaze drift up towards the windows, and back down to the street, where a young boy was passing us on the pavement.

"Excuse me," Holmes said. "You wouldn't happen to be Simina's boy, by any chance?"

The boy stopped, looking at us with utmost curiosity. "No, that'd be Maiwand. Do you want to talk to him?"

I stiffened, thinking that he couldn't possibly have said what I thought he had said, but sure enough, the boy leaned his head back and called up to the house: "Oi, Maiwand! There are some gents who want to talk to you!"

There was a brief glimpse of a dark head in one of the windows, and soon thereafter another half-grown boy came out of the house into the street. As soon as I saw him properly, I knew that I had not misheard the name. His face was as unmistakeably Pashtun as any I had seen, though his clothing, the cut of his hair, and his manners were that of a born and bred cockney boy.

As was his voice, which became evident when he spoke. "What's this then, captain?"

An innocent question spoken in a familiar accent, wrapped in a harmless package. Perhaps it should have been a comfort, but instead it only served to make the cut sting harder. I swallowed hard, willing the memories away.

Holmes thanked and dismissed the first boy, and as soon as the three of us were relatively alone on the street corner, he said, "You're Simina's boy?"

"Yessir," the boy said with some caution.

"Is there anywhere we could talk in private?" Holmes held up a shilling. "I'll give you this."

At the sight of the shilling, the boy's tense shoulders relaxed a little, his face a blend of emotions, with amusement being the most prominent. "I don't do that. My mam made me promise not to. And anyway," he added helpfully, "A shilling is a lousy price."

"Indeed," I said. "Ten pounds for a virgin."

Holmes laughed. "Oh no, we only want to talk, I swear."

The boy stuck his hands in his pockets and leaned back, so as to get a better view of us. Holmes mimicked the gesture, though of course he had to look down rather than up.

"No need for that jackknife of yours."

Startled, the boy took his hands out of his pockets again. "How did you know..."

"Oh, I know a lot about you," Holmes said. "I know that you're ten years old. Eleven this autumn. Birthday in... August, perhaps?"

I closed my eyes for a second. Usually, I enjoyed hearing Holmes take on unsuspecting strangers, but I took no pleasure in this deduction, especially since it was one I could have made myself.

Meanwhile, Holmes carried on to win the boy over, with speech as well as money. "I know that you make money running errands, and that you were down by the Thames this morning. I know that you have befriended a large, ginger tomcat. I know, although this I have been told, that you like horses." Lowering his voice to a mumble, he finished, "I know that Mrs. Aisling Cooper thinks the world of you."

The boy's whisper was barely audible. "You're here for Dora?"

Holmes's nod was if possible even more discreet.

A wide grin spread over the boy's face. "All right then. Follow me."

He ran ahead, around the corner towards one of the back entrances, and we followed, I with a reluctance that did not escape my friend.

"Problems, Watson?" he asked in a deceptively offhanded tone.

The boy had now reached the cellar stairway and was waving for us to come closer, while he hoisted up his trousers with the other hand. They were a smidgeon too large for him and had slipped down enough when he ran to have the hems almost dragging the ground.

"Do you believe in ill omens?" I asked, my eyes on the boy.

"No, I do not. It is a superstition carried on by people who lack the ability to see the true patterns in life and thus prefer to fabricate such of their own choosing. It is quite beneath you to suggest it. And if I did believe in ill omens, they would not come in the shape of ten-year-old boys with patriotic parents."

"Patriotic!" I said bitterly.

"One man's patriot is another man's villain. Futhermore, I can assure you, even after a whole five minutes of acquaintance, that young Maiwand's loyalty to his friend is stronger than any desire he might have to cause trouble for an Englishman." He tipped his hat back with his riding crop. "Come on."

* * *

During our adventures, I have had cause to see many cellars in the seamier parts of London, and most of them have been dank, dreary places, sometimes with rot and filth spreading noxious fumes. In contrast, the cellar we now entered was clean and well-kept, with various storage areas as well as smaller rooms. Despite Mr. Jennings's foul tastes, they clearly did not spread to his physical milieu.

The boy led us to a tiny room by the southern wall, with enough space only for a bed and a simple chest, and the floor was cluttered with pieces of string, sticks, fishing hooks and other treasures boys drag home. Yet there was a faded curtain hanging in the small window by the ceiling and a thick quilt on the bed, giving it a sense of home after all.

"No one ever comes here," he said, sitting down on the bed with his arms resting on his knees, fists under his chin. "So who are you? What do you know about Dora?"

Holmes explained to him what Mrs. Cooper had told us and the promise she had made regarding his future.

His eyes lit up. "Blazes," he said slowly. "Well, I'll help you find her if I can, that's for sure, sir. She's not in here, though. I'd know if she was."

"Do you know where she might have been taken?"

He thought about it. "I've run errands for Jennings sometimes, I know some of his places. Not all of them."

"Could you find out more?"

"Oh yes. That's all about listening, isn't it?"

"A man on the inside. Brilliant. It'll be like a supplementary branch of my Irregulars. Now, dare I hope that you might also be able to take us to the scene of the crime? Without anyone finding out, of course."

"What? Oh, you want to see Dora's room?"

"Exactly!" Holmes pointed at the boy with his riding crop. "Lead the way, soldier!"

For a moment, the boy seemed to ponder whether or not Holmes was mocking him, but having deemed my friend sincere, his mouth curved into a smile as he ushered us out of the room.

I could not determine whether Holmes's open compliments were an attempt to put the boy at ease, to compensate for my own sullenness. If the roles had been reversed, that would have been my reasoning. Yet I suspected that his motive was rather to irritate me out of my foul mood. Either way, it seemed the best course of action was to aquiesce and do what Holmes always told me: let myself be guided by logic rather than emotions. Logic told me that the boy was trustworthy, and that I had dealt with enough unpleasant situations in both my professions to behave accordingly.

We made our way up the back stairs and entered a corridor on the second floor, which had bare but clean floorboards and wallpaper that would perhaps not have suited the Queen's sensibilities.

There were plenty of muffled noises coming from most of the doors, but the boy ignored them all and led us to a door near the far end, opening it with such caution I think he may even have been holding his breath.

The room was dominated by such a large and luxurious bed that for a brief moment I wondered if Mrs. Cooper had been lying to us about her daughter's maidenhood, but then I caught sight of the second door in the back and realized that little Dora's room was behind her mother's.

"Hmm," Holmes said, surveying the room as he closed and locked the door behind us. Thanks to the terrible weather, there were plenty of footprints on the floor, though most of them were overlapping. Holmes clicked his tongue disapprovingly. "Too many people, far too many people, it's all a jumbled noise... I see Mrs. Cooper dropped the bread. Understandable, considering the circumstances. She picked it up right away, though. Waste not, want not."

He walked up to the door in the back wall and examined it. The edge of it was torn; there had been a hasp which was now lying loose on the floor. The child's room itself was small and bare, yet with a touch of flair to make it a home, just like with the boy's room in the cellar. The bedsheets were hanging off the edge of the bed in a rumpled pile, the chest of drawers was half-open, and next to it lay a broken china plate, the shards so small I could not quite make out the pattern. From what I could see of the room, it had been Dora's only treasure.

"Ah, that's better, much more distinct," Holmes said upon seeing the prints on the floor. "And of course, there's the lingering smell of chloroform."

I sniffed the air, able to detect the scent, if just barely, now that Holmes had mentioned it. "So they drugged her."

"Not at first," he said. "Or rather, they tried, but she fought back most valiantly."

"She would," the boy said, and then, "Hang on, how do you know that?"

"The state of the bed means she was ripped out of it. Our friend downstairs saw to that." He pointed to some large footprints. "Having rather more trouble with her than he'd expected, he dragged her to the middle of the room, where he managed to subdue her."

The boy's mouth hardened into a thin line. "I'll kill him."

"You will do no such thing. It would raise suspicions. Speaking of which, pardon me."

Returning to the outer room, he started rummaging through the wardrobe in a hasty way most unlike his usual precise method, which made me believe he was looking for something in particular. He did not seem to find it, however, since he closed the wardrobe again and instead ducked down under the bed, pulling out a large drawer beneath it.

"Ah!" he exclaimed and held up a strange contraption of leather straps attached to a large object, which upon a second look turned out to be a phallus.

I gave a strangled noise. "What on earth is that thing?"

"Really, Watson, you should be able to deduce that from the presented evidence."

"Oh, _that_ thing," the boy said. "It's for –"

He proceeded to explain the item in language so coarse I confess I felt my cheeks heat. Holmes, ever the cold fish, did not seem perturbed at all.

"It is heavy," he said and tried its weight in his hand before hanging it on the door handle. "There. If it falls down, we are bound to hear it."

"The door's locked though," said the boy.

"So it is, but locks have keys. One is on this side. If another key is put in from the outside, this one will fall out and the lock will open. Is there another key?"

"Well... yes."

"In that case, precaution is the best course. I'm sure the ladies will pardon us. Now, where was I? Oh yes!"

He rushed back to Dora's room again and we followed. It all felt rather a lot like a rugby match at that point, but at least it meant that Holmes was regaining his focus.

"Now, as for Jennings," Holmes said, pausing for a moment by the broken door, "he remained here to watch. Letting his underlings do his work for him. Well, that is a shocking development, I'm sure. A tall, stout man, certainly large enough to handle a little girl, yet he lingers by the door, passive. I suppose he didn't want to wrinkle his expensive clothes. Then there's the third man."

He knelt down to examine the floor more closely. "Much smaller than the other two, smokes Egyptian cigarettes, and was punched in the mouth, presumably by our little Dora. Interesting. By the level of blood in this spit stain, I assume he was hit by her elbow, since I very much doubt she could reach that kind of impact with her fist."

"It could have been the other man's elbow," I pointed out.

"True. Either way, she caused quite a tussle before they managed to chloroform her. That will make the case much easier."

"How so?"

"It's always easier to rescue a brave person than a cowardly one." He stood up and went over to the chest, where he started pulling at the drawers. "The smaller man came over here and took some clothes. Mostly undergarments, a pair of shoes, a blue cardigan..."

"She did have a blue cardigan," the boy said in wonder.

I couldn't help smiling. "All right, I'll bite. How do you know?"

"My dear Watson," Holmes said, pulling fibres of wool from the edge of the drawer. "The concept of lint shouldn't be foreign to you."

A sharp thud from the main room interrupted us. The contraption on the door had fallen off, and the key fell after it as another was turned from the outside.

Holmes moved quickly but quietly, grabbing onto the boy and pushing him down on his knees. I hurried to shut the broken door as well as could be done, to buy us a precious minute or two. Meanwhile, Holmes pulled out his shirt, unhooked his braces, and unbuttoned his trousers. The boy, catching on, leaned his head back and put his hand on Holmes's thigh. The effect was that of a very lewd tableau.

Steps came closer, and when they had proceeded halfway through the outer room, Holmes gave me a brief nod. I peered out the door, careful to take on an expression of surprise and dismay at seeing the guard before me. It was the same man as before, and I hoped that the boy could hold his tongue, now that we knew that the man had been involved in the vile act.

"What's going on here?" the guard barked, shuffling me aside, which I let him do without any resistance. I had no intention of letting him know my strength until I needed it.

Holmes and the boy did their best to appear as though they had been caught in the proceedings of a carnal transaction. Holmes, as always, was formidable, the very image of a shocked and humiliated client with his blood still stirred. The boy, too, was surprisingly effective. The guard's suspicions melted away from his face, though the anger remained.

"Oi, you," he snapped at the boy. "What do you think you're doing? All business goes through me!"

The boy stood up slowly while Holmes rebuttoned his trousers. His hands were trembling and his air of wounded dignity so comical that I had to bite my lip and avert my gaze.

"I only wanted to try it," said the boy. "To see what it was like."

"Yeah? And what of that promise of yours to your precious mam?"

"I haven't broken it yet, have I?" the boy said cheekily. "And I won't, either. I changed my mind, I hate this."

"Snotty little bastard." The guard grabbed the boy by his hair and tossed him aside with a dismissive flick of the wrist. "Now, listen here, guv," he told Holmes. "If you want a boy, you have to go through the proper channels like everyone else. How much did you pay him?"

The boy looked panicked, and I remembered the shilling Holmes had given him before. Clearly, he was very afraid to lose it. I took pity on him and chimed in: "Payment afterwards, we agreed. Since he wanted the right to change his mind."

"Afterwards?" The guard guffawed. "For heaven's sake, lad, are your legs _that_ much faster than your brain? Always ask for money up front. Maybe it's just as well you stay running errands. So, gentlemen, what's it going to be? Do you want to stay here with the ladies, or try Dorset Street?

Holmes snapped his braces back on and tucked in his shirt. "Well, I couldn't possibly, after this!" he whined in a squeaky, indignant voice utterly unlike his own. "The shock has rendered me useless, probably for hours. As if I did not have enough problems in that regard! Come on, Roberts, we shan't patronise this establishment any longer."

"Roberts," of course, meant me, and as Holmes sauntered out of the room, I tipped my hat at the guard, who muttered, "No loss, I'm sure."

There was still the boy to be considered. He seemed sharp enough to head downstairs to meet us again, but it would not be wise to linger on a street corner. Thinking on my feet, I gave him some quick instructions in my rusty Pashtu. By his surprised smile, I could see that the message had got through.

"What did you say?" the guard asked suspiciously.

Looking him in the eyes, I told him coolly, "I said, 'A pity. I like little brown boys.'"

* * *

Holmes waited until we were back on the street before he asked, "What rendezvous point did you set for us and young Maiwand?"

"The Crown," I said. It was the only place nearby I had been able to translate in a hurry, and it was four blocks away, which was perhaps a bit more distance from the house than was strictly necessary. On the other hand, an alehouse provided enough background noise to keep conversations both private and inconspicuous.

It also provided actual ale, which was what Holmes and I ordered when we had walked the four blocks and found a suitably secluded table at The Crown.

"So what's next?" I asked Holmes, sipping at my drink. "Do you have a lead?"

He looked up at the ceiling and drummed his fingers slowly against the table, thinking. "Not as such. We have plenty of options, of course. We could ask Lestrade to arrest the doorman, but I very much doubt he would give us any information. We could follow him, but there's no guarantee that he would return to the place where the girl is kept. Our best option at this moment is to continue investigating Mr. Jennings's various businesses. I could call in the Irregulars, but truth be told, I think it'll be quicker to use the supplementary branch."

"Meaning the boy."

"Maiwand. Yes." Holmes raised his glass. "Speak of the devil."

I turned my head and saw the boy standing by the door, looking lost. Holmes made a discreet little wave, just enough to catch the boy's attention and send him on his path to us.

"The troops gathered at last!" Holmes said. "Tell me, now that we have a clearer image of who and how, do you have any ideas as to where?"

"I do!" the boy said, sitting down. "See, I got to thinking, and the way you described the little man, it could be this bloke I've seen down with the fencers. Stolen goods fencers, that is. Pickles Brown, his name is."

"Pickles?" I asked, marvelling – not for the first time – at the strange nicknames people saw fit to call themselves.

"Yes, he's..." Having set his eye on me, the boy lost track. "Say, how do you know Pashtu?"

"I learned some in the war," I said, cursing myself for what had in the moment seemed like a good idea. I was an adult and could set my instinctual feelings aside for a better cause. I was not at all sure the boy could do the same thing.

His eyes widened, and then narrowed. "So you're one of _them_."

"If that's how you want to put it, yes."

"Pickles!" Holmes interrupted rather loudly, and then in a much lower voice. "Pickles Brown. What of him?"

"Oh." His attention once again on the matter at hand, the boy said, "I saw him this morning, in the kitchen. I remember wondering what he was doing there, he's hardly ever at the brothels. He had a split lip and everything..." The boy's features set in a grim expression. "It must have been right after. If I'd only known!"

"What happened, happened," Holmes said with a shrug. "Where can I find him now?"

"Fencer's dens, usually. There are four of them, one big one and three smaller ones to use whenever there's trouble with the big one."

I threw Holmes a glance. Four different locations could take all night to search, with an increasing risk of exposure the longer we proceeded. A night out in this chill also meant that by the time we found the girl, I might be rather a lot stiffer than was ideal for a rescue situation.

Holmes's thoughts evidently went in much the same direction. "Aren't you late for supper, Watson?"

"When am I not? You wish to go on without me, then?"

"I thought I might try on a few disguises, yes. I will call on you before I carry out any measures, of course."

I nodded. Holmes seemed revitalised enough that I could leave him on the trail with no ill effects, and though I doubted I could get much rest with the girl still on my mind, at least Mary would be pleased to have me home for the night. I drained my drink, gathered my walking stick and put on my hat. "Good hunting to you, then."

"What about me?" asked the boy. "What am I supposed to do?"

"You come with me, of course," said Holmes. "I need a local guide."

The boy's eyes glittered. "Do I get to wear disguises too?"

"You're ten years old," Holmes said firmly. "That's all the disguise you'll ever need. Nobody ever pays any attention to a ten-year-old boy except his mother, and since you don't have one..."

"Holmes!" said I, shocked, though not surprised, at his inconsideration.

"It's true, though, isn't it?" said the boy. He peered at me where I stood by the table. "Aren't you coming?" From his tone, I could not say if he lauded or lamented the fact.

"He insists on facial hair," Holmes said lightly.

"I insist on this," I said, raising my stick. "Rather more recognisable than a golden tooth. Get me back in time, that's all I ask."

* * *

Mary's surprise upon seeing me made me feel rather guilty. After all, when she had agreed to marry me, the assumption had been that I would concentrate my working efforts on my medical practice, rather than on my function as Holmes's unofficial assistant. She had dealt well with the changes in the arrangement, but she deserved better than to be made a grass widow more often than not. I did my best to keep our very belated supper pleasant, grateful for our general rule never to discuss my work during mealtime.

Afterwards, I tried to settle in the library with a book, but my mind kept returning to Holmes's investigation, and the content of my novel remained a mystery to me. In the end, I gave up and decided to retire early, but as I lay in bed waiting for Mary to join me, my restlessness only grew until I found myself back in the library again, this time to try my luck with poetry.

Mary came down a few minutes later, dressed for bed, her gentle face showing deep worry.

"I couldn't sleep after all," I said.

"John, this case of yours..."

"I can't." I stood up, putting the book of poems aside. "It has me... upset. Right now, there is nothing I can do to help with it in any way, and so I would prefer not to talk about it or think about it, or indeed, for it to _exist_ at all." I spoke with more fervour than I had intended, and Mary remained silent for a moment as she grasped the implications of my behaviour.

"Shan't you come to bed, at least?" she asked. "Perhaps it would help take your mind off things."

With this statement, she moved in closer to kiss me, and made some gentle marital advances. I confess that this line of action has previously been successful in preoccupying me in times of stress, but this time her hands on me and my reaction to them only made me think of what might at that very moment be happening to the girl. I shuddered and recoiled rather abruptly.

"John?" she asked, stunned by my unexpected reaction.

"I'm sorry," I said. "Not tonight."

She bent her head in a nod and stood thinking for a moment before she asked: "Would it benefit the case if you got some sleep?"

I thought of Holmes, out on the trail. He would need me fresh and alert when he called on me, and my current fretting did no good at all. "Yes."

"Then come back to bed." She kissed me lightly on the forehead. "I will warm some milk for you."

"Am I a child, in need of such measures?"

"I may as well practice, for when we have little ones of our own."

When I was a child, my mother had always warmed milk for me when I could not sleep. The memory alone made me yawn, and Mary laughed at the sight.

"Get Mary Jane to warm it," I said.

"No. I want it to be drinkable."

At that, I laughed too. "I don't deserve you."

"As long as you remember that," she said, giving me a quick kiss on the forehead.

* * *

I'm not a very sound sleeper at the best of times, and this night I tossed and turned almost as much as I had back when Blackwood was still slaughtering women for his rites. The hours seemed to drag on forever, but I must have fallen asleep, because I woke up with a start when Mary prodded me and whispered, "There's someone at the door."

Years of medical practice has trained me to react with perfect alertness at any suggestion of an emergency, no matter the hour. I had my legs in trousers, my arms in a shirt, and was reaching for the medical kit by the time my conscious mind caught up with me and I realised that this was no patient. Instead of the medical kit, I pocketed my revolver before I headed downstairs.

Our maid, Mary Jane, had by some miracle overcome her personal lethargy and beaten me to the door, albeit still in her dressing gown. I met her halfway down the stairs, where she informed me, "There's an Indian boy to see you. Says Holmes sent him."

I didn't correct her assumption regarding the boy's nationality, but simply hurried past her down to where he was waiting for me.

"You've found her, then?" I asked him.

"Yessir. Holmes says to bring a rope, ice picks, a piece of leather or thick cloth about this size, and..." He paused, trying to remember his instructions. "Oh, right. The swordstick, not the oak stick."

Since the swordstick was my default choice, that last command could only mean one thing. I took a closer look at the boy, whose black hair was dripping with water. A few melting crystals were still visible on the lapel of his jacket. "It's _snowing_?"

"More of a sleet, really."

"And the streets are icy?"

"Yes."

I sighed. Holmes was right; in such weather I usually would take the oak stick. His request to the opposite meant that he was expecting trouble, and of course under such circumstances I had no choice but to obey his wishes.

A rope and some ice picks were easy enough to find, which left the leather. Mary had come down after me, and as I put on my warmest coat, I asked her, "Are you terribly attached to the hearth rug?"

"Not in the least," she said. I could read the doubts and worry on her face, yet she did not voice them, but merely went to fetch the sheepskin rug and hand it to me along with my hat and gloves.

As I opened the front door, however, and braced myself against the cold and the wind, my determination must have stirred some fear in her, because she grabbed my arm hard and urged me, "Be careful out there."

The blasted sleet was practically horizontal, but I managed a smile for my wife as I gave her a farewell kiss and my assurances that I would keep caution.

* * *

A four-wheeler was awaiting us at the street corner, and the boy dived straight for it, enjoying the weather no more than I did. He slipped inside without a word to the cabbie, while I paused and asked, "What address shall I give, then?"

"What? Oh, Covent Garden somewhere, can't remember exactly how to get there, but he already knows the place. Mr. Holmes gave him a whole lot of instructions."

The logic of that sentence seemed to be missing a step, and I started to ask the obvious question, but a gush of wind against my back reminded me to get inside the cab. Even before I had sat down, the driver beckoned the horses, and we were soon traveling at a very quick speed for London streets, even at night. Clearly, some of the instructions given to the driver had concerned pace.

"How does Holmes know the location if you do not?" I asked.

"What?" The boy had been looking out the window, though what he could see at that speed, in the darkness, I did not know. It took him a second to return his focus to what I had said. "Oh. He'd heard of it before, apparently. We found that bastard Brown and overheard him saying that he'd made a delivery to Harrison's Garden House. Or Harris's Garden House. One of those. And Mr. Holmes said it meant a really old whorehouse that used to belong to this chap called..."

"Jack Harris," I filled in.

"Yessir."

I doubted that Holmes, even as a schoolboy, had ever sat chuckling with his chums over a secret copy of the old _Harris's List of Covent Garden Ladies_, but he was nothing if not tenacious when it came to charting the London underworld. Though I had never heard of any house of the Pimp General's still being in use, it did not surprise me that Holmes did, or that he knew the exact location of it.

"And was she there?"

"She was." The boy set his jaw, which made his face seem even younger, to a jarring effect. "She was sitting in the window, in her petticoat, for all the world to see, as if she didn't care."

His voice had sunken into a tenor growl, but there was no reproach in it, only sorrow and rage that made me wonder if, when we reached the house, I should try to convince him to stay behind, so that he would not throw himself into some fight that could only lead to his death.

Holmes, as always, was ahead of me. When the coach stopped in Covent Garden, we were approached by a gentleman, primly dressed but deep into the late stages of intoxication, who clung to the coach door and said in Holmes's unmistakeably sober voice, "Good job, Maiwand. Now, you know your orders."

"Do I have to?"

"I'm afraid so. Watson, you're with me."

With that, Holmes stepped back enough that I could climb out and join him on the street, with the rug rolled up under my arm. The boy remained seated, which surprised me.

"Shan't you join us?"

"No," Holmes said firmly. "He shan't. Carry on, good fellow!"

The last command was directed at the driver, who smacked at his horses and was off, apparently having been given previous instructions too. This meant I was the only person involved who did not have a full grasp of events.

"So where are they off to?" I asked Holmes.

He leaned heavily against my shoulder and slurred, "Would you believe the nerve of them, claiming I'd had enough? I get to decide when I've had enough!" Much closer to my ear, he murmured, "Paddington. Maiwand will wait for us there. I see you have all the necessary equipment. Excellent."

Gusts of alcohol stench spread my way whenever he moved, though they seemed not to come from his throat, rather from his clothes. _My_ clothes, I noticed with some dismay, though it bothered me less than the way his weight pushed the hearth rug off balance and almost myself along with it.

"Please stop doing that."

"Oh, have a heart!" he complained loudly, before resuming his low tone. "Just staying true to form, old friend."

As I readjusted my grip on the rug, he leaned against me again in a most uncomfortable way. I moved aside, but the tip of my stick slid against the icy ground and I had to wedge it between two cobblestones to keep from slipping entirely.

"Will you _please_?"

"Pardon," he said and immediately straightened at the hiss in my voice. Seconds later, he pulled me through a garden and gave up the drunken act entirely.

"Over here," he said quietly. "Up in that window. That's her."

I looked up at the sturdy brick building, dark in its colours and made darker still by the night and the deep shadows of the trees. On the far side of the first floor, there was a lit window, and I could hear rowdy voices, but that did little to alleviate the appearance of the house, which seemed to me most ominous, even taken on its own. The presence of a little white figure in a second-story window turned it into a Gothic image the kind of which would have made Miss Catherine Morland clutch a novel in delight. All I felt was a red-hot rage, and I did my best to control it and remain as cold and unperturbed as I knew Holmes wanted me.

"The windows are barred."

"You're not looking high enough, my friend." Holmes nodded towards the sloped roof, where, now that he mentioned it, I could glimpse the vague outline of a window above the girl's room.

"Isn't that an attic window?"

"Not at all. The dim light suggests a second window somewhere – it's much too faint to be a lamp, even a night light. Now, if we follow the pattern of the light backwards, we end up..." He gestured with his riding crop and stopped right at the window where Dora was seated. "It is a very small window, but she has a slender frame, she should manage."

"What if there is someone else in the room?"

"I don't believe there is. She knows we're here; as you can see, she has put on her clothes."

I could _not_ see, from down below and in the dark of night, but I said nothing.

"In doing so," Holmes continued, "she showed a jerkiness of motion that implied eagerness and anxiety, but she did not look back; her concern is not for anything right behind her. She is alone in the room, and she is awaiting rescue, so there is no time to waste."

With that, he walked up to the wall of the house and started taking off his boots.

"What on earth are you doing?"

"Can't climb in these. Do you have the ice picks?"

I took them out of my pocket and handed them to him. "Do you need them to pick the ice from your toes?" I asked with some sarcasm. At the current temperature, it would not surprise me if Holmes got his feet stuck on the roof.

He tutted in response and took the rug from me. "I hope you don't mind if I make this a bit smaller. No? Good." Using one of his knives, he cut the rug into a three-foot square, while his naked toes curled against the cold ground. He hung the square over his shoulder along with the coil of rope and stuck the ice picks in his back pocket. "Give me a hand up?"

"You really intend to do this barefoot?"

"Hand up?"

I shook my head, but laced my hands together for Holmes to step on. As I raised him up, he was able to grab hold of the bars of the second-floor window and clambered up to standing position. From there, he stuck the first and then the second ice pick into the mortar and moved up onto the roof. I exhaled, and realized that I had held my breath without even noticing.

He took his time up there. To me, he was only a dark outline, but I knew that he was using his set of tools to cut out the ceiling window. There was a crash of broken glass, heard not only by me – someone cried out from the ground floor.

"Holmes," I gritted out. "Hurry up!"

He put the rug over the edge of the window and lay down on his stomach. Soon thereafter, he was joined on the roof by the smaller figure of Dora, and they had a brief conversation that I could not hear from down below. What I _could_ hear was people moving about downstairs, and I saw the light of a lamp going from room to room, closer to us with every moment.

Holmes remained on the roof as he hoisted up the rope after the girl and offered it to her again. Thus, as he stood fast against the windowpane, she climbed down carefully until she was far enough down to jump. I caught her as gently as I could manage and put her on the ground.

"Holmes!"

He half-climbed, half-fell off the roof and landed on his feet like a cat.

"Here's what we do," he said, bending down to put on his boots. "Start walking towards the road. Do not run! Miss Dora, take Dr. Watson's hand."

Wide, pale eyes met mine, and I rather pitied the girl; she had every reason not to want to take the hand of a strange man, but she did as told. It rather seemed an unnecessary measure – at her age, she could surely get by on her own.

"Hello, Dora," I said in an attempt to put her at ease. "Ready to go? Good girl."

There were shouts and scrapes indicating that people had seen us, and I hurried to usher Dora through the garden, Holmes right behind us. Very soon, I heard the door slam and felt a twitch from Dora's hand in mine. I squeezed it in what I hoped was a reassuring manner and moved on.

We reached the street, and Holmes closed in beside us as he surveyed the few passing vehicles. "No, no." He pointed at an open wagon coming from the east. "That one. We will cross the road diagonally and reach the back of the wagon as it arrives – there."

I nodded and kept walking, at the top of my pace, with Holmes on one side and Dora on the other. We had put some distance between us and our pursuers, but halfway across the road, there was a gunshot, and a bullet whizzed past us, which startled the passing horses.

It also startled Dora, who slipped her hand out of mine and ran towards the wagon.

"Wrong angle!" Holmes shouted, running after her. He caught her just as she was about to bump into the side of the wagon, picked her up, and threw her over the edge onto the load.

This caused the driver to halt his horse and cry out, "What's going on here?"

"We just need a ride to the station," Holmes panted.

"Does this look like a coach? Get off right this second!"

Holmes jumped up into the driver's seat, hauled him out of it, knocked him unconscious and dropped him in back with the girl. Holding the horse, he shouted, "Watson!"

I did not need to be called twice. I had already broken into a run, something I could not hold up for long but did not need to – the wagon was only a few yards away, and I scrambled into it, grabbed the railing, and held on for dear life as Holmes urged on the horses once again. They were nervous and skittish at losing their driver, but deferred to Holmes's authority, perhaps because they found it preferable to the noise of gunfire behind them.

"Are you all right?" I asked Dora, as I got my revolver out and prepared to fire back.

"Yes." She held on to the railing too, but seemed more relaxed now that we were picking up speed. "I'm sorry I ran."

"It is only natural that you would." I could see our pursuers at the end of the street, trying to get hold of horses, and I fired two shots toward them.

"But he told me not to."

"Mm." I threw a glance at Holmes. In my most generous of moods, it would never occur to me to list consideration among his many qualities. Yet now it struck me that he had planned our escape, not to suit the running stride of a frightened child, but to suit mine. "You're doing very well."

The men had managed to find horses for themselves, but were by now so far away that I put down my revolver so as to not accidentally hit an innocent passerby. Instead, I focused my attention on the poor owner of the wagon. Though still unconscious, he was not deeply under, and I checked his reflexes, trying to ascertain whatever we should do with him once he woke up.

"Have we lost them?" Holmes called over his shoulder as he turned a corner.

"No, but keep it up and we might. Do you have any money on you?" I nodded towards the driver. "Rather hard on the poor bloke."

"I didn't have time for arguments," Holmes said, but he tossed me his wallet and I retrieved a few bank notes for the driver.

Dora kept her eyes on the street, her mouth firmly pressed together and her fingers white in their grip against the railing. "They're still behind us."

They were, and although the horses they had chosen were not as excellent as the one pulling us, the heavily loaded wagon slowed us down, and I was not entirely sure that we could outrun our pursuers. "Don't worry. If we can't lose them now, we will give them the slip once we get to Paddington."

"Paddington? Are we going somewhere?"

At least to that question I could give a both truthful and reassuring answer. "To your mother in Bath."

"Oh, _yes_!" Tears rose up in her eyes, which surprised me only in the sense that it had taken this long for it to happen. "She sent you?"

"Yes."

More gunshots were heard, and I cursed, biting the words off as I remembered my present company. I reached for my gun, but before I could raise it, Holmes turned another corner and continued down a narrow street.

The zigzag pattern through the streets jolted the driver awake, and he gave a few half-choked coughs that I hoped were not signs of concussion-induced nausea.

I had dropped the bank notes when Holmes turned the corner, and as I turned to pick them up now, I accidentally bumped my stick, which started a sliding path downwards. Before it could tumble down onto the road, Dora snatched it and offered it to me.

"Thank you," I breathed. "Would you hold on to it, please?"

In answer, she gripped it tightly and brandished it like a weapon. Although our pursuers were much too far away to fight with such means, I could certainly understand the impulse.

"Murder," the driver muttered, still too disoriented to shout. "Thieves... help..."

I held up the bank notes. "Nobody means to hurt you. We will compensate you for all your troubles. As soon as we're safely at Paddington, the wagon is all yours again."

The money did wonders for his state of mental acuity, and he glared at me. "I'm not a blinking coach!"

That was a point very well made, and in my mind, I cursed Holmes for not holding on to the four-wheeler that had taken the boy and myself to the area. Granted, a vehicle like that was rather conspicuous, and cooperation from a coach driver by no means more guaranteed than from this chap.

I brought out some more notes. "Of course not. Which is why we'll pay you double fare. Plus expenses for jeopardy."

"Jeopardy? I could be _killed_!"

"Keep your head down, you'll be fine."

He grumbled some more, but took the money and made no attempt to fight us. Holmes's choice of transportation might not have been as ill-conceived as I had feared.

We were followed nearly all the way, but as Holmes steered us nearer to Paddington, I craned my head and declared, "I think we lost them."

"They're not idiots, Watson. They will have figured it out." Holmes pulled the horse to a halt and reached out a hand for Dora. "At least we may hope that by the time they get here, we are already on our way to our next destination. Sir, I thank you ever so much for the use of your wagon and the formidable creature that pulls it."

The last bit was directed at the driver, who muttered something under his breath. Though I could not hear the exact phrase, it was not hard to guess.

As Holmes aided Dora down from the wagon, she gave a small squeal and slipped away to run towards the station house.

"She is a quick one, isn't she?" Holmes commented.

I let my gaze follow her and sighed when I saw her throw her arms around a smallish, tattered figure. "The boy."

"Just where he should be!" Holmes clapped his hands together. "Come on! I think perhaps the nearest men's room will be the best spot."

* * *

We had arrived early enough that the station was half-empty, and the men's room of Holmes's choosing entirely so, which to some degree alleviated the awkwardness of bringing Dora inside.

"Watson, position yourself by the door. You two, switch clothes."

My military training has taught me when to simply follow commands without question, and years of working with Holmes has solidified that training; I did as told. The children, of course, did not have my experience and both took issue with the order. Dora took a step back and wrapped her arms around herself, and the boy looked from her to Holmes with an expression of bewilderment that slowly turned to distaste.

"You want me to wear her clothes?"

"That's right, and I want her to wear yours. Thus, you can serve as a decoy and double our chances of escape." When neither child moved, Holmes added, "There is no need for concern, we will be there to protect you."

At that, the boy shrugged, took off his cap, and unbuttoned his shirt. After a second or so, Dora said, with a hint of hysteria in her voice, "Don't look! Don't anybody look!"

I immediately turned my back, and can only assume that the others did the same, since all I could hear were the shuffle of feet and the light rustle of clothes. At one point, footsteps stopped outside and someone tried the door handle, but the way I was standing, the door would not open, and as the footsteps left once again, I prayed that the man outside would simply think the door locked and proceed to the next men's room.

"Is that blood on your petticoat?" the boy asked, sounding both fierce and worried. "Did they hurt you?"

"I'm fine. Just put it on."

I closed my eyes for a second, knowing all too well the cause of those bloodstains. Yet I said nothing, nor did any of the others until Dora quietly informed us that she was done.

Both children looked rather awkward in each other's clothes, though I noticed that Holmes's approximation of their respective sizes had been correct; the clothes might be unfamiliar and uncomfortable to their wearers, but they were a near perfect fit. Dora, with her hair stuck under her cap, might at a passing glance certainly be taken for the opposite sex, but the boy, for all that he tried to wrap her shawl around himself, suffered greatly from his lack of demure femininity.

I gave them an approving nod, but Holmes was far more critical. He circled the children, pulled at the dress and gave the cap a slight push to change its angle. Once he deemed his work finished, he stepped back and scrutinized them again.

"Very well, that will do. Clothes, however, can only take you so far. Can you _be_ who you're dressed to be?"

The children remained inactive for a moment until Dora, in a most eerily masculine manner, stuck her thumbs under her braces, tossed her head back, and gave us a roguish grin.

"Excellent! And now you, young master. What can you give us?"

The boy gave his friend a bewildered glance and straightened his back, as if to make himself a few inches taller. Our immediate "no" at that misguided gesture made him sink back again, square his shoulders for a second, and then relax.

"That's better, actually," Holmes said in a pensive tone. "So what say you, Watson? Boy or girl?"

"In what sense of the word?"

"Quite. Decoy?"

"Yes." It was by far the most sensible choice. We needed every bit of Holmes's resourceful mind to keep the girl safe, as we had promised her mother. Decoy work meant I was more likely to end up in some sort of altercation, but that I knew I could handle. I opened my revolver and made sure that it was still loaded, although I had no extra ammunition to compensate for the shots I had already fired.

As Holmes pulled off the details of his disguise and with only the means of a false moustache and some chalk changed himself once more, he explained, "We will take the first train to Southampton. You will go north. Switch at the first stop, go back, switch again. If you see the men, remember, their respective guns have been fired three, four, and six times. React accordingly." Ushering Dora gently ahead of him, he gave us a curt nod and stepped outside. A moment later, there were two knocks on the door, which meant coast clear, follow in a minute.

Having waited the proper time, I put my arm around the boy's shoulders in a protective fashion and opened the door. He still did not seem comfortable in his disguise, and so I muttered, "Act frightened."

A few fake sniffles came from under the shawl, followed by a hitch of breath and some very real sobs. It was probably quite a relief for the poor lad to let his feelings out; he was only a child after all. I made no comment, only steered him towards the platforms as I searched the area for followers.

As we reached the first platform for north-going trains, I saw the back of a man who raised my suspicions. From behind and at a distance, I could not recognise him, but his stride was much to quick to be leisurely, yet with an erratic pattern to it that I soon realised could be best described as a zigzag. I peered closer and noticed something strange about his stance that to me cried "gun"; Holmes, of course, would have known exactly to what that strangeness could be ascribed. I did not, but it was enough to tell me that this was indeed one of our pursuers, right before he turned around and showed his face.

He had not yet seen us. If we dived into this platform, we would avoid his path; but there was no incoming train there, and thus it meant a dead end. Also, by doing so, I would not well serve the purpose of decoy, which was, after all, to divert attention away from Holmes and Dora. Still, I had the boy to consider, and he was in a dress, which would hamper his movements worse than the chill did mine. If we were to alert Jennings's thug to our presence, we needed a suitable way to compensate for our disadvantages – preferably one that did not involve me shooting him in the back.

I could tell from the man's stance the exact moment when he noticed our presence, and I quickly moved in front of the boy as I took my revolver out of my pocket. There was no place for cover, as I was some distance away from the walls and the platform was deserted, but there were no civilians directly in the line of fire either, which must surely count as a blessing.

I fired as soon as I was sure the boy was safely behind me, which was still a split second later than my opponent. His bullet whizzed past us, mine hit him in the hip, sending him to the ground with his pistol sliding some distance away.

The few people in the area screamed and shouted; some of them ran. Perhaps with some good luck, the flurry of movement would distract our remaining pursuers enough to let all four of us slip away in peace.

"Come on, this way," I said, and we hurried down the path towards the other platforms, with a wide berth taken around our fallen foe in case he was still alert enough to attempt some form of violence. There was a train farther down; I had no clue as to where it was going, but then, that issue was secondary. Or tertiary, even.

I did look back once and again, but clearly not often enough, because I did not realise that the other two men had caught up with us until two shots were fired from behind, causing me to stumble.

I caught myself on the boy's shoulder. The strange offset of my balance worried me a little, but less so than the splatter of blood I saw on his clothes. I had no time right then to inquire further for his health; satisfied that he was still standing upright, I turned back and fired my last shots at the men approaching, but to my surprise and chagrin, I missed. Something must be wrong, for me to miss at such a distance – and then the pain caught up with me. I glanced down, and saw a telling red stain spread from the right side of my coat. The blood on the boy, then, had not come from any wound of his, but from my own.

The men had stopped their fire and now ran towards us. I remembered what Holmes had said about the number of shots. The fallen man had shot at me, so he could not have been the six. The ones remaining had fired twice, meaning that they had either one bullet left, or none. It it was none, I was quite confident that I could still take them down, injured or not.

Either they had no bullets left, or they did not want to damage their target, because they took the guns down and ran towards us. The boy started running too, and only then did I notice that his shawl had fallen down, revealing his short hair and dark complexion.

The men, naturally, saw it too and lunged forward. I fought one of them aside with a few quick blows of my walking stick, but meanwhile the other one slipped past me and grabbed the boy. I quickly turned to fight him off too, but the man behind me punched me hard on the right side of my back – straight in the bullet hole. My blow slid off my target's arm, and the pain bent me over, my chest racked with coughs.

"You little rat!" my intended target said, shaking the boy. "You've led us on a merry goose chase, haven't you just?"

There was a glimmer of metal in the man's hand, and I quickly grabbed a good hold of my stick and sent it forward once again, hitting him in the side of the thigh so that he lost balance. Ignoring the pain, I then spun around and raised the stick higher, giving the man behind me a hard blow on the neck. He fell over, half-choked, and I felt a strong satisfaction in the strangled sound – an eye for an eye, as they said.

The man closest to the boy was still off-balance, but quickly regaining it, and he still had the knife in his hand. The boy, bless his soul, tried valiantly to fight back through a well-placed kick, but by doing so, he was straight in my path.

"Stand aside," I hissed in Pashtu, unsheathing my sword. I had very little time to move before our assailants would regain their composure. The boy, without hesitation, threw himself away from us, and I attacked, aiming low so that I cut through the man's stomach and could follow through with a rising curve, spearing through his lungs. Though the wound itself was not large, he was to all intents and purposes gutted like a fish, and blood spurted out of his mouth. By the time he reached the ground, he was already dead.

The fight was taking its toll on me, and to save time and precious movements I struck back with the shell part of my stick, but the wood met with nothing. I turned, prepared for whatever I might face, but the remaining thug was already backing off and broke into a run before I could stop him.

My immediate thought was to ascribe his course of action to sheer cowardice, but then I realised that running was the wisest course of action from his point of view, if he were to find his _real_ target. I took a few steps in his direction, but quickly found that I could not follow him. The blood loss and pain were making me lightheaded; I could barely remain upright.

"Go after him," I said quietly, and when that got no response I barked, "Maiwand!"

He looked up, his eyes so wide the white showed above the iris. There was blood all over his shawl and dress from the man I had killed, and his hands were shaking. When I spoke, it was with disgust at my own words, to know that I was once again sending this mere child into mortal danger, but I could see no other course of action.

"Don't let him get to Dora," I said. "Run!"

A glimmer of laughter appeared in his frightened eyes, and he ran, quick as a rabbit, past the man and towards the trains, moving in confusing patterns that could lead the chase on for as long as needed.

"Dora!" he shouted. "Dora, where are you? He's coming for us!"

I smiled at the false urgency in his voice. When his performance did not call for femininity, he was quite the actor.

One man still remained alive and nearby, the first one. I doubted that he could be of any danger, but just to make sure, I walked over and used my foot to nudge his gun farther away; if my calculations were correct, there might be a shot left. I did not dare to bend down, since the fire in my side was considerable and spoke of at least one broken rib, possibly two. From my position, I could see that the man was still conscious, but barely so – his eyes tracked me with difficulty.

The sensation of a hand on my back made me grip my sword hard. Quite possibly I would have run the owner of the hand through, had he not simultaneously said, "Doctor Watson?"

Something about the voice was familiar. I turned my head and tried to place the young face beside me. His headgear was familiar enough – one of Lestrade's men, then. The one Holmes often spoke of with a hint of approval.

"Officer... Hopkins, is it? The last assailant ran that way." I waved with the tip of my sword, which was still rather a lot too bloody to sheath. "I should be much obliged if you would care to capture him before he harms anyone."

In retrospect, it would not have been unreasonable of Hopkins to argue, but he lived up to Holmes's high opinion of him by simply saying, "Give us a description and we'll be right on it. Do you need a doctor?"

"About five foot eight, grey hair, thick jaw, ratty brown suit. Chasing a boy in a dress. And I am a doctor." I looked down at the stain spreading across my side. "Though now that you mention it, I'd appreciate someone to sew me up."

* * *

Lestrade came to see me while I was still being patched up. The bullet had cut a gouge along my side, but not damaged anything more vital than the ribs; altogether, I could count myself lucky.

"I've got one man in custody, one on his way to the morgue, and am apparently on the look-out for a third," Lestrade said. "Care to tell me why?"

My shirt was lying next to me on the table and I held it up, considering whether or not to put it back on. It was such a sticky, torn mess that there did not seem to be much point, but I would prefer not to have to go home half naked.

"They tried to kill me."

"And you succeeded in killing one of them. I could arrest you too, so don't be so glib. What've you got yourself into this time, Doctor?"

A part of me wanted to tell him the truth; for all that Lestrade was not a particularly intelligent man, he was an honourable one. With that colleague of mine sewing me up, however, it was not a risk I could take.

"I'm afraid that is confidential."

"Confidential? Not from me, it isn't. Do you _want_ to be sewn up?"

The accidental humour of the statement made me smile. "Yes, please. But that's already being handled."

"Where's Holmes?"

"Not here." I decided to take some pity on the man. "Listen, it's really quite simple. The boy was running away from those criminals, I helped him, they tried to kill us, I had to defend myself. That is all."

"Boy? That tall, bloodied child who ran circles around the station? It was a boy, then? Two of the witnesses said it was a girl, but Hopkins swore that it was a boy."

"Hm. Holmes is right about Hopkins – he has good sense. Is he unharmed, then? My companion, I mean?"

"I suppose so. Looked a fright, but when we tried to get hold of him he ran off like his arse was on fire. Who is he, then?"

"No one of consequence."

"And yet they tried to kill him?"

"Yes."

Lestrade waited for me to elaborate further, and when I did not, he sighed and asked the doctor, "Will you be done soon?"

"In a minute."

"Good."

Thus, while I was given the last few stitches and a dressing, Lestrade watched with his hands resting on his back and his chin down, like a stern schoolmaster. The resulting effect was quite comical, though my colleague seemed to find no amusement in it. He pursed his lips, finished his work, and sent me on my way, which meant to an interrogation room with Lestrade.

"So tell me," Lestrade said. "What's going on?"

"Is this conversation official or unofficial?"

"Unofficial, damn you! I have no interest in hearing some story Holmes has concocted for you."

"I am fully capable of concocting my own stories," said I, offended at his suggestion otherwise.

He growled at me, and I did not blame him; after all, he was not so much a fool that he could not see that I was stalling. I trusted his promise of secrecy, but not necessarily his capacity for it. Still, he had managed his charade well enough last November, in a much more pressed situation.

In the end, I told him about the whole case, leaving out only the identifying details.

"That's the truth, is it?" he asked slowly. "All this for the safety of a pair of street Arabs?"

Put like that, I could not blame him for sounding so incredulous.

"That's right."

"And now you want me to lie about it."

"I will deny ever having this conversation, yes. I very much doubt your prisoner will be very interested in revealing the truth either."

"He could say you attacked them unprovoked. I could have you arrested for murder."

"You said you had witnesses. They will have seen how it all went down. I'll say I was on a case. That Holmes had uncovered..." I halted, searching for something that would be truthful, and found just the thing. "Stolen items. There are at least four different fencer's dens; it shouldn't be hard to prove. Though perhaps you should keep mum about that until Holmes has returned and can disclose their locations."

Lestrade stared at me, and I rather imagined that I could see in his beady eyes a desire to lock me up for life and throw away the key. "That whore must be bloody beautiful."

"That is _not_ the point," I said frostily.

"Oh, so she is, then. Don't ever ask me to do this again, Doctor. Not ever."

I relaxed and gave him a most grateful smile. "Thank you. I'll try not to."

Not until I had already hauled a cab and was on my way home did I remember that wagon that Holmes and I had commandeered on our way to Paddington. I probably should have told Lestrade about that.

* * *

Mary must have waited by the window, because when I pulled up by our house she was already standing in the doorway, and as I stepped out of the cab she ran up to me and took my arm.

"Good Lord, John!" she exclaimed, her other hand flittering down to the red-stained tear in my coat.

"I'm fine," I said, though I gratefully accepted her support. "It looks worse than it is; I didn't have any change of clothes ready."

"You are not fine," she said with emphasis. "You are pale as a sheet and dragging your legs, and you need a _rest_."

"I do," I admitted. There seemed to be no purpose to a denial, when even the small obstacle of the stairs sent a triple jolt through my body.

She stopped outside the door and faced me, a deep wrinkle forming between her eyes. "Do you promise to rest?"

There was nothing in the world I desired more, but something in her tone warned me off. "Why?"

"Do you promise?"

"No. Why?"

For a few seconds, she remained quiet, and we stood watching each other like two cats in the same territory, until she relented. "The Indian boy is back."

My immediate reaction was, of course, one of relief, but then I remembered the man still on the loose, and my blood ran cold. "Here? Have you seen anyone else? Any strangers?"

"No, I haven't. At least... just people passing by, the same as always."

This probably meant that we were safe; I doubted the man I'd fought or any comrades he might have rounded up could remain clandestine enough to escape my wife's attention. Even so, it was not a risk I was willing to take, and I hastened to open the door and pull her inside.

"Right," I said. "Here's what's going on..." I silenced as I saw the boy – Maiwand – come out of the kitchen. Once again, he was back in boy's clothes, either borrowed or stolen, judging by how very poorly they fit him. I was surprised at how pleased I was to see him.

"Oh, there you are," I said with a smile. "Are you quite well?"

He nodded, his eyes drawn to the blood on my coat. "Are you?"

"Of course. Just let me change my clothes and I'll be right as a trivet. Ready for Bath?"

"John, you can't," Mary protested.

"Mary, I must." Despite my joking echo of her sentiment, I was deadly serious. "I don't think we were followed here, but I cannot be sure. The best I can do is to finish the task I was assigned, which is to take this young man out of the city."

Mary set her jaw. "Very well, then I shall come with you."

"You most certainly shall not! I can't have you to worry about!"

"I can hold my own."

"So can I, and yet you're still worrying, aren't you?"

She pursed her lips and blinked furiously, and I stepped in closer, taking her hands, since any attempt to hold her in my arms would ruin her clothes as thoroughly as mine.

"Take heart, my dear; I have survived worse."

"And what is my mission, then?" she asked bitterly. "Is this where I say 'with your shield or on it'?"

"If you like."

"I don't like. Will you have breakfast?"

By the tone of her voice, it would not be advisable for me to reject breakfast. Even so, I hesitated. It was very tempting to have some breakfast, put myself to bed, and let Maiwand stay in the meantime. I do not have Holmes's skill for calculating statistics, but I considered it a fair wager that, despite the man on the loose, neither one of us had been followed here.

And yet, I had overexerted myself enough times before to know that if I allowed myself to relax, I would be useless for the rest of the day, possibly more. That was more than ample time for Jennings's thug to return to his master, gather up resources, and find out my identity. As grateful as I was for Constable Hopkins's appearance at Paddington, there was no doubt that having the police involved made everything rather inconveniently a public matter.

If someone _did_ show up, I believed I could handle the matter – I was, after all, in my own home with access to any weapon of choice – but I did not like the idea of bringing Mary into it, nor to expose a half-grown child to any more danger than necessary.

While these thoughts chased each other through my mind, my eyes rested on the boy, who misinterpreted the gaze and said, "I've already been given breakfast. And very good it was, too!"

"Then you can sit and wait," Mary said. Her voice was mild, but steel bared underneath and aimed at me.

"Perhaps a hamper," I said, giving my beautiful wife a disarming smile. "And some time for fresh clothes."

It was a compromise, and one not entirely to Mary's satisfaction, as evident by her expression, but she did not argue. "Very well," she said, "I'll arrange one."

* * *

It was a good twenty minutes until I once again donned a somewhat thinner coat and my hat and prepared to leave the house. Mary saw me off with a rather heavy basket of food.

"Make sure to _eat_ this."

I offhandedly passed the basket over to the boy, to spare my ribs. "Thank you."

Mary still glowered with displeasure at being forced to let me go without her, but I remained certain – fairly certain – that my decision was a sound one. She would be much safer in the house, if not entirely so.

"Do you know where to find my medical kit?" I asked.

"Of course. Do you need it?"

"No. I thought you might. I want you to choose a scalpel, small enough for its casing to fit in your pocket, and keep it there in case anyone tries to threaten you."

That softened her face to some extent, and she attempted a joke, "Shan't I just hide in the kitchen with a skillet?"

I answered as if the question had been asked in all seriousness. "If you have time to retreat to the kitchen, by all means do, but it's far too limited for any length of time. After all, it's quite possible, even likely, that nothing will happen at all."

"Very well," she said with a short, sharp laugh. "I'll find a scalpel."

We said our goodbyes with some awkwardness, and as we approached the door, I stepped in closer and took her hand, unwilling to depart on such poor terms.

The last remaining stiffness in her posture subsided, and she returned the kiss I gave her. As we pulled apart, she patted my arm, and said with utmost gentleness, "With your shield or on it, then – you bastard."

I had my revolver tucked in my pocket along with an extra round of ammunition, but I could see no suspicious characters as we hailed another cab and went back to Paddington, and my immediate impulse upon reaching the station was to find a train that would take us straight to Bath. Fortunately, the boy's eyes were keener than mine. On our way to the train tracks, he suddenly gasped and dug his fingers into my arm. "He's here."

My right hand clenched harder on the walking stick, and my left sought its way into the pocket where I kept my revolver, but I tried to keep my voice level and my stance at ease, so as to not raise any unneeded suspicions. "Which direction?"

"Left."

I glanced left, and there was the thug indeed, arms crossed over his broad chest, yet blending rather better into the crowd than we were, since he was a few inches below me in height. It seemed that he had chosen to lie low and remain where he was, in the hopes that we would return – which we just had. Clearly, I had accidentally spared the thinker of the lot.

"No need to worry," I said quietly and hoped that I was right. There were rather too many people around for this; I could not start any sort of fight without endangering them, and increasing Lestrade's troubles tenfold. On the other hand, I doubted that the man would be much keener to fight us under these circumstances.

"What do we do?"

"Take a train to the north."

I could tell exactly when we were noticed, from the sharp jab of fingers in my arm. I suppose it was too much to ask even of the bravest ten-year-old to stay entirely calm in a situation like this.

Nevertheless, no one approached us or opened fire on us, which meant I had been correct in my assessment; mindful of what had happened earlier, the man had chosen a different approach.

There was a train ready and we climbed aboard. The strain was uncomfortable, but I allowed none of that to show; it would not do for the boy to become even more skittish.

He glanced out the window as we sat down, and yelped. "He's getting on the train!"

"Calm down," I said. "We are in a public area, and our backs are covered. Even if he is foolish enough to attempt to overtake us in here, which I doubt, we can best him before he ever reaches our seats. Most likely, he will just keep us under surveillance."

He thought about that. "So we'll just have to give him the slip?"

"That's right."

"Oh, that's easy, then!"

Evidently I was more convincing than I had any right to be, because he leaned back with a grin and relaxed.

Easy? Yes, easy for a child with the speed of a rabbit. For myself, I wondered if perhaps I would be forced to resort to violence after all.

As luck would have it, though, there was a train on the other side of the platform as we reached the first station. I jumped up, abruptly and somewhat ill-advisedly, and hissed, "Now! Hurry!"

For the first few steps, Maiwand followed behind me, but then he scuttled by and went out the door, while I half-ran after him, hoping that he would not end up shot or captive.

When I exited the train, I found that he had caught hold of a train guard and that they stood conversing by the door of the other train. People poured out of both trains and bustled about on the platform, but I could not see our pursuer. Either he was slow out, or he attempted to stay out of sight.

"All set, then?" the train guard asked when I reached them. "Good. Welcome!"

He slammed the door shut after we had stepped inside, and just as the station manager waved for the train to leave, I saw the thug make his way towards us, a smidgeon too late.

"Blimey," said the train guard with evident concern. "Another one who was on the wrong train? Not a friend of yours, is he?"

"No," I said, my face as straight as I could muster. "I wouldn't say so, no. Definitely not."

"Well, I hope he doesn't have some appointment that he'll miss now."

"Quite. That would be terrible."

The boy's capacity for pretence was not sufficient to cover such a situation: his laughter was so hearty that he puzzled the poor train guard.

"You must excuse my young friend," said I. "He is so very happy that _we_ will not miss our appointment. Thank you ever so much for waiting."

* * *

Maiwand's good mood was persistent, now that we were safely out of harm's way. He laughed all the way back to London, and once we were on the train to Bath he took a great interest in the views passing by our window, and chattered endlessly about all that he saw as he helped me finish off the basket of food.

"Keep your head in," I reminded him. "We don't want it knocked off by some random post."

He obediently withdrew his head from the window. "Could that happen? Gor, look at them cows! And they're not even frightened by us! I'd be frightened, if I was a cow and some big black beast came rushing by. I suppose they see a lot of trains. Those fields do go on and on, don't they? To think, we can see them all, so very far away, like a street stretching out in every direction at once."

"Is this the first time you've seen the countryside, then?" I asked, though of course it had to be.

"Yessir. Oh, that knobbly old tree is funny-looking, isn't it? What's it called?"

"Which tree?"

"Oh, never mind, it's gone now. I never knew trains were so fast. I could stay on forever... Have you ever lived in the countryside?"

"Not the English countryside, no."

"Some other country's countryside, then?"

I failed to respond in proper time. I had started to reconcile myself to his name, but behind it was a whole chasm of diverging experiences that I could not begin to bridge. With my general weary distaste of the whole mess called war of late, I was probably the least suitable person to try.

As luck would have it, though, we passed a small brook, and he proceeded to spit into it, hence forgetting all about a question that, to him, was not of any essence.

The journey took several hours, of course, and by the end of it, his enthusiasm had been muted to a quiet pleasure, evident only in his eager eyes that still followed the landscape outside.

Since I was no longer required to participate in any discussion, I did my best to give myself some of the rest Mary had wanted for me. It proved a strenuous task. The food had helped restore some of my vigour; no doubt I owed much to the red meat. Even so, the jolts of the train sent both new and old wounds into complaints, and my back responded with a row of violent spasms. I dug my hand into my thigh and willed the arm to stop shaking.

When the conductor passed by our compartment and shouted, "Bath!" I gathered myself and my possessions together.

"Well, then. That's us. Perhaps you could run ahead and fetch us another cab?"

He did so, and I endured the last few minutes of travel until at last we reached Mrs. Cooper's house. The building and garden gave a favourable impression; they were by no means large, but neat and aesthetic, with a sense of home about them. I confess that the fleeting, unkind thought passed through my head, that Mr. Bolton surely must have hired a gardener or some other servant, since the lady of the house, despite her beauty, could never have consciously created something so pleasing to the eye.

Said lady of the house opened the door at our knocking and, at the sight of us, pulled my companion into a motherly embrace. "Oh, Maiwand, I'm ever so glad to see you, duck. You too, Mr. Wa... no, sorry, it's Dr. Watson, isn't it?" She reached out with a slender hand and squeezed mine. "I cannot thank you enough. Mr. Holmes has told me how much you've done to help rescue my daughter. Thank you, thank you _so much_!"

Emotions overcame her and her voice broke, leaving it almost inaudible as she invited us in. "Is there anything I can do for you, Doctor? Have you eaten? Either of you?"

"Thank you, but we ate on the train."

"Where's Dora?" the boy exclaimed. "Is she well? There was blood on her dress."

Mrs. Cooper's pained gaze met mine. "Dora is quite well, sweetheart. She's resting right now; it has been a long night for her."

"I can't see her?"

"I think perhaps not just yet. In a few hours, I'm sure she'd love to see you."

He seemed very disappointed, but soon lit up again. "Then may I see the house? Will I really live here?"

"Yes, you will, and yes, you may." She smiled down at his eager face and then turned to me. "What of you, Doctor? Do you care to be shown around?"

I cared not at all, but it would have been utterly impolite to say so. Fortunately, Holmes at that moment turned up in a doorway to say it for me: "I think, madam, that the doctor should like to have a warm bed and perhaps a bath. If you please?"

"Oh, of course!" Flustered, she hurried towards the stairs. "This way, gentlemen."

Much too tired to make any standard polite claims that it was all too kind, I followed, and was even quite relieved to feel Holmes's hand, barely perceptible yet reliably supporting, at the small of my back as we ascended.

"Here you are, sir. We'll get you your water swiftly; I'll ask the maid for help." There was a tinge of pride in her voice at the word 'maid', as if she could not herself believe that such a creature really existed.

"Thank you so much," I said and loosened my tie, with an eye on the thin but soft bed. As soon as the door closed, I sank down onto it and closed my eyes.

"And thank _you_, Holmes," I said. "Your perception may have saved my life, or in any case my dignity."

"Damn your dignity and that stiff upper lip of yours," he replied. I could feel him starting to take off my boots. "You were falling apart down there! Mrs. Cooper must be blind not to have seen it."

"She has not known me as long as you have," I reminded him gently.

"Where are you hurt? Chest area? You have lost some blood – surely it was not a stabbing? You could not have travelled this far with a stab wound."

"Gunshot. It's a mere scratch, really. Nicked a couple of ribs, that's all."

"You have been home to change, yet Mary let you go again? That does not speak highly of her matrimonial efforts."

"She was against it, I can assure you," I said. He had proceeded to unbutton my coat, and I opened my eyes and batted his hands away. "I am perfectly able to undress myself."

"That is a statement of most dubious veracity."

"My dear friend, don't _fuss_. I cannot abide it."

He sat down beside me and rested his hands on his lap, though he still gazed at me with concern through narrow eyes. As I undid the rest of my buttons, I gazed back, and was pleased to find that apart from the expected signs of a sleepless night, he seemed to be in perfect health – indeed, better than he had been the day before. The adventure, as I had predicted, had done him good.

"I trust all went well on your end?" I asked.

"It did, yes. One of the men came dangerously close to our train at one point, but our young friend lured him away. I must confess, it gave me a moment's pause to see that you were not with him, but by his jaunty steps I could determine that you were not too grievously injured."

"And Dora? How did she fare?"

"Well enough. She has pluck, that one; not so much as a stir as they ran past us. Many grown women would not have done so well under similar circumstances – indeed, I could say the same for some men."

I hummed in agreement, my thoughts dark despite his words. Reluctantly, I asked the question to which I already knew the answer, "We were too late, weren't we?"

Holmes remained quiet for a near minute, his face serious. "That is a matter of definition," he said in the end. "She is alive and well out of that place. I would say that is some measure of victory. Yet in the sense that you mean – I'm afraid it was too late long before we graced the scene."

Although I am ashamed to admit it, in some roundabout way this was a relief to me. At least we had not made the situation worse by dawdling.

Holmes was observing me in that intense way I knew meant he was practically reading my mind.

"Watson, surely you know that if she had been in any immediate danger when I found her, I would not have waited for you."

"Yes," I said. "I suppose I do know that."

Heavy steps came up the stairs, and we fell silent. I pulled my shirt back together, not so much for modesty as to hide my bandages from Mrs. Cooper, who certainly had enough on her mind.

She came in the door now, holding one end of a bath tub while Mr. Bolton held another. The maid and young Maiwand came trailing after, each holding two large buckets of water. As the women and the boy prepared the bath, Mr. Bolton lingered by the door. He offered us some polite greetings and expressions of gratitude, but his gaze returned constantly to Mrs. Cooper, often accompanied by a besotted smile.

The sight of the bath being filled at first gave me pleasure, but then I belatedly realised the impediment my current condition presented when it came to partaking in that pleasure. "You should not have gone through so much trouble," I murmured, ashamed.

"Oh, it's no trouble at all," said Mrs. Cooper, who added, with evident pride and joy, "There is a _tap_ downstairs!"

"A tap? Really? How wonderful," I said meekly. As soon as the bath was poured and the four of them gone, I whispered, "Bother it all, Holmes..."

"Don't fret, old boy," he replied. "If your bandages are giving you trouble, I can hold you standing in the bathtub and wash you off."

"That would be a fine sight if they come back! What would they think of us?"

"Does it matter? It is not as though they would care."

"_I_ would care," I said with emphasis, feeling my cheeks heat. "I don't like to have people spreading untruths about me."

He watched me in silence for a moment, and I did not need his gifted eye to know the line of his thoughts – what, precisely, my definition was of 'untruth'.

"Another alternative is that we could pour some of the water away and leave the rest for you to soak your limbs."

"My limbs are fine."

"Liar."

The calm certainty of his comment infuriated me, and I snapped, "Just – splash the water around a bit so they don't find out that I've spurned their kindness."

"Very well, then," he said coldly. "And then I suppose I shall wire your wife."

"I would be much obliged."

"Dear Mary. Stop. Am in bed at a prostitute's house. Stop. Yours, John."

I raised myself up on my elbows, despite the jolt of pain that gave me, and stared at him. "Why do you bring Mary into this?"

"Do I?"

"This... ridiculous resentment of her. I thought you were over it."

"Wishing things were different is not resentment."

I sat up, with some difficulty. "And just how different do you want them to be?"

Holmes looked away, and I regretted my bitter words, yet some part of me gloated in having said them.

"Speaking of resentment," he said quietly.

I waited. An apology would be too easy, too insincere.

"Your decision to marry was voluntary. My nature is not."

"I know that," I admitted. It was a delicate conversation, but all the same, it was one we should have had many months ago. "Neither is mine. But you cannot have it both ways. If you will not have me, I must be permitted to seek my happiness elsewhere."

"I never said you couldn't." The coldness in his voice would have been unbearable, had I not known him well enough to tell how deceptive it was. "But why a _wife?_ Could you not have arranged for something much like Mr. Benton and Mrs. Cooper?"

"No, I could not!" I snapped. "That's an abysmal idea. I want a lover who will be a _friend_, whom I can take to the opera as well as to bed. Beyond that, I want a family – a home."

He blinked. "You..."

"I was willing to give that up for you. I will not give it up for naught."

"Naught? What of our friendship?"

"You _have_ my friendship, you cantankerous fool. I'm here, aren't I? Still following you on madcap adventures."

"Following? You begged for me to take this case!"

"That's true, I did."

Holmes's affronted protest, and my admission of its truthfulness, eased some of the tension, and even as I averted my gaze, I could not help but grin.

He sighed deeply, and then exhaled in a manner very reminiscent of a laugh. "My dear blockhead, the door locks and bolts. Your reputation is quite safe, and as we've established, so is your virtue. Now, will you please swallow your bloody pride and step into the bath before you faint of overexertion?"

"I never fainted in my life!" I said, but took off my shirt and let my trousers fall.

"There's a first time for everything."

Though I scoffed at that, I proceeded with caution, even going to the length of resting my hand on the edge of the bathtub as I stepped inside. The hot water stung for a second, and then spread such glorious warmth that my knees buckled.

Holmes grabbed my upper arm, just long enough for me to regain my composure, and asked, "Shall I pour out some water for you?"

"Please."

He grabbed one of the buckets and filled it halfway up. With long strides, he carried it to the window, which he flung open to pour the contents outside.

"They'll notice that," I said. Not that I cared very much. I allowed myself to slide slowly into sitting position. Despite the low surface, I did get my bandages slightly wet, and would probably have to change them afterwards – but as long as the stitches were not in jeopardy, it was worth the trouble.

"You would be amazed at the number of things people don't notice," said Holmes and closed the window. "I only hope the rosebed beneath will not fare ill."

"I shouldn't think so," I said, leaning back with closed eyes. "While the water is perhaps warmer than July rain, it is hardly scalding."

He approached the bath tub and stuck his hand in the water, rubbing it up my arm to spread the warmth. The sensation made me shiver, especially as he went further up and began working out the knots in my damaged shoulder.

"Thank you."

"You do seem to get hurt a frightful lot lately. Is it a sign of carelessness, I wonder?"

"It is perhaps a natural effect of choosing the role of decoy."

"Those things are not mutually exclusive."

His fingers dug in deeper, and against my will I felt my body react to his touch. Well, as Holmes had unfortunately pointed out, it would not cause any complications.

"And perhaps also," he said, reaching into the water to proceed his massage with my lower limbs, "it has to do with your desire for conduct becoming an officer and a gentleman. When you see a chance to stand up for the innocent, you don't give yourself time to think before you rush in. It is evidence of your romantic view of life, much like those ridiculously embellished story notes you have shown me."

"They are not so embellished," said I, my vanity a little bruised by his words.

He continued as if he had not heard. "Or indeed like this case itself."

That was a more serious matter than my dabbles in literature, and I opened my eyes. "It was a good and necessary case."

"It is a case that has reached its conclusion, and as such should no longer keep your muscles ready for attack." His hands shifted position, to show the tension clearer, as if I did not know my own body.

"I suppose... I suppose I am still concerned for the girl," I admitted. "What shall become of her, after this?"

"Would you like me to play sibyl? Very well, I will. Mr. Bolton's money will give her a comfortable life for the foreseeable future. Mrs. Cooper, a cunning creature, will find some place for her beyond that. Not, I think, as a mistress. Not after this. No, I suspect she will take a position somewhere, and later marry some worker or other, to live a reasonably happy life – ever after. Is that a good enough fortune or shall I throw in a dark stranger and some oversea journeys?"

My thoughts on the children, I said, slowly, "If you did, I'm not sure you would be so very far off."

He guffawed at that, stood up, and handed me a towel. "The knots are out, at least. As for the rest of your pains, you'll have to sleep them off. I brought no drugs with me."

I dried myself off, with some support, and perhaps it was another sign of what Holmes called my 'romantic view of life' that I told him, "You do know, don't you, that I am yours in every way you ever wanted of me?"

He smiled, a small, gentle smile that belied his often so callous exterior, and leaned in to kiss me.

I knew that it brought him no pleasure; it was a deed for my benefit, devoid of any passion – and yet, through that, all the proof of his affection that I could ever need.

It was our first such kiss. To date, it has been our last. And though I know it is madness to write of the case with such candour, even in private, I cannot in any way bear to change my account, nor to leave it out.

I rely on my confidence that Holmes will keep it safe for me.


End file.
